Apps are a big part of what makes a smartphone a smartphone. They are small programs, ranging from simple tools to elaborately designed video games, that can be added to your touchscreen device to make it more useful and entertaining. Follow the steps below to learn how to find and install free apps for the smartphone operating system (OS) of your choice.

Steps

Method1

iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch Apps

1

Download iTunes. Before you get any free apps, it is essential that you have iTunes on your computer, or the App Store app on your phone. iTunes can be downloaded for free at http://www.apple.com/itunes.

Be sure to get the correct version of iTunes for your operating system.

Once you've downloaded iTunes, find the download and double click on it to open and run the installation program.

The App Store app should come preloaded on your device. Tap to open it.

2

Find the App Store. Open iTunes and look at the sidebar on the left to find the “iTunes Store” link. Click the link to load the store inside iTunes.

Once the store is loaded, look at the dark bar along the top of the window and click the “App Store” button.

You don't need to do this if you're browsing from the App Store app on your device.

3

Filter by price. The most basic method is to filter all apps by price. Click or touch the search bar and type “free” into it. Hit enter and wait for the screen to load.

You will see two groupings: one for iPhone apps, and one for iPad apps. Next to each group header there's a link that reads “see all.” Click it to display every free app for the device of your choice.

This method displays huge pages of free apps, but there's no way to search within those results except by manually browsing. There's no way to organize or reorder the apps, either.

4

Filter by type, then price. You can choose to filter to a certain app category before looking at free apps in that category, but only the most popular free apps can be easily found using this method.

From the App Store page, click the drop-down menu at the upper right and select a category. Alternatively, you can click the triangle next to the App Store button on the black bar at the top of the screen.

Scroll partway down the splash screen that appears. You will see a sidebar on the right labeled “Top free apps.” Click the link next to the header that says “see all.”

Browse the most popular free apps on the next page. You can organize your results by name, popularity, or age. Only the top 200 most popular apps in each category are displayed. On the plus side, it's likely that these apps are all well-designed, reliable, and useful.

5

Browse blindly. This method allows you to find any app you want, but there's no way to filter free apps from paid apps.

Choose a category or start from the main page. Click any featured category to browse it. Click on any app to check its price (the price will appear on a gray button to the left of the screen that loads next).

If you haven't found what you want yet, type the category name into the search bar and hit enter. This will yield a mix of apps that contain the search term, including apps from other categories that have the search term in their names. However, the results will skew towards the appropriate category.

If you want to find a specific app, type its name into the search bar from the App Store and hit enter. If the app is available, it will appear in the search results.

6

Download your app. Once you've found a free app you want, be sure your device is linked to your computer and click the gray button on the description page to download the app. Sync your device to complete the process.

If you're browsing from your device, simply tap the gray button to download it directly.

You can check the apps you've downloaded by clicking the Apps category in the left sidebar of iTunes, below the Music category.

If syncing doesn't seem to work, try dragging icons from the Apps category directly onto the name of your device, displayed in the left sidebar.

Method2

Android Apps

1

Decide how to shop. This guide is primarily designed for adding apps from your computer to a linked Android device.

Connect your device to your computer before you begin, unless using your device to shop.

If you're shopping with the Google Play Store (aka Android Market) app on your device, the process is simpler. Tap the icon to get started.

Browse free apps by “Top Free” category on the left side of the screen. Click “All Top Free Apps” at the bottom of the category to view the most popular free Android apps. Your results will be limited to the top 480 most popular free apps.

4

Browse popular free apps by category. If you have some idea of what you want, click the “Categories” tab at the top left of the screen to see a list of categories, including several game categories and a long list of non-game categories.

Choose the category you're interested in.

Look for the tab that reads “Top Free” in the middle of the screen, near the top, next to the “Top Paid” tab.

Click the tab to browse the top 480 free apps for the category you chose.

5

Search by name. If you know the name of the app you want, use the search bar to look for it directly. Enter the name of the app into the bar and hit enter.

6

Download your app. Click the gray “Install” button to retrieve the app. If you haven't accessed the store with your device before, you will be prompted to do so now.

Once the store knows what device you're using, download the app. It should install directly to your phone.

Method3

BlackBerry Apps

If you'd like to download apps directly to your device, click the link on the BlackBerry World main page that reads “Download BlackBerry World for your smartphone.”

2

Visit the store. Click the blue button that says “Browse and download apps online,” or tap the BlackBerry World app icon on your device to open it.

3

Choose the appropriate category from the top (light gray) menu bar. The categories are Apps, Games, Themes, Music, and Video.

The Apps category is for apps that don't fall into one of the other categories, such as calendars, calculators, and social media tools.

4

Scroll down the page until you find the "All Apps" category.

5

Click the radio button to the right of the category header that reads “Free.” You're now browsing all free apps in the selected category. You can reorder your results by name, vendor (brand) name, popularity, or age.

6

If you know the name of the app you want, use the search bar to find it by name instead.

7

Download your app. On your device, this is as simple as tapping the “free” button; to download through your computer, you will need to take a couple of extra steps.

Click the “free” icon to get the app directly from the search results page, or click the name of the app to read more about it first, and then click the blue button to get it.

Log into BlackBerry World using your BlackBerry ID.

Download the app per the instructions that follow.

Sync your BlackBerry device with your computer to transfer the app to the device.

Community Q&A

If this question (or a similar one) is answered twice in this section, please click here to let us know.

Tips

Many websites also offer custom apps for download directly from the site. These apps are usually free, and typically do little more than provide quick, streamlined access to site content on your device. To get them, use your device's Internet browser to navigate to the appropriate site, and then tap the app link or icon to install it.